Amazon Coins

E-commerce leviathan Amazon today is taking a step into social gaming: Amazon Coins, its new virtual currency, is now live in the U.S. To kick it off, Amazon announced that it would put $5 worth of the currency — equivalent to 500 Coins — into all Kindle Fire users’ accounts to use on apps and in-app purchases on its platform. The company says that this is equivalent to… Read More

Editor’s note: Charles Edward Hudson is a venture partner with SoftTech VC and the CEO and co-founder of Bionic Panda Games.
I have been trying to wrap my head around Amazon’s decision to launch Amazon Coins as a currency. It struck me as curious because most major platforms who have offered universal, platform-wide virtual currencies have dialed back those efforts or simply… Read More